


Years Gone By

by pie_is_good



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-21
Updated: 2009-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-04 21:49:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pie_is_good/pseuds/pie_is_good
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A story told in reverse, Hawkeye remembers the MASH and the people he knew there over the years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Years Gone By

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Skew](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skew/gifts).



> Thank you to my lovely last-minute beta, shayheyred!

_1975, May_

Hawkeye never saw any of them again. He thought about them, often, because they weren't the sort of guys you could forget, these days more than ever. With the war in Vietnam ending, the bittersweet memories came flooding back to him faster than he could stop himself from remembering. He tried not to think about Henry too often because he was the one he couldn't visit. The only one of his friends at the MASH 4077 who hadn't lived to tell the tale.

He'd heard from some of them, of course. Klinger eventually returned to Ohio with his new wife. BJ finally was the one that his little girl called 'Daddy.' He'd lost touch almost completely with Margaret and Charles, though Charles still sent a Christmas card each year. Hawkeye suspected Charles didn't really have much to do with it arriving in his mailbox.

Radar went back to the farm to take care of his mother for the last few years of his life. Hawkeye had gotten an invitation to his wedding a few years back. He'd smiled when he saw it, and now it sat in a drawer in his front hall. He couldn't bring himself to throw it out, even though he hadn't attended.

Trapper went home, long before everyone else, and he wasn't the guy that Hawkeye had known. He'd mellowed out when he returned home, realizing that he'd missed out on so much of his wife and daughters' lives while he was gone. He was a husband and a father. Hawkeye couldn't imagine he'd lost his sense of humor, and Trapper probably drank more than he had before the war, though Hawkeye didn't know for sure.

He'd spoken to Trapper a few times when he'd gotten back to the states. They'd even tossed around the idea of meeting up with Hawkeye in Maine so close to Trapper in Massachusetts, but they never got around to it.

He'd loved Trapper when they were bunkmates who chased women and cracked jokes and consumed enough poorly made gin to kill an elephant, but that's not who they were anymore. Hawkeye hoped that he wasn't the only one who didn't want to see the other, but to Hawkeye, that had to stay in the past. The war seemed so long ago, and yet it stayed with him, and seeing Trapper somehow would bring all the more into focus. He hoped with all of his heart that Trapper didn't take it personally.

Colonel Potter finally retired – he was the only one Hawkeye spoke to with regularity Somehow, it was easier. The regular Army guy, the one who knew how to put it behind him better than the guys who were drafted, and the man who had been more of a father to the camp than their commander. When he passed away, Hawkeye thought of attending his funeral, but the decision had been made for him. At the last moment, he was needed in surgery. Hawkeye had to stay in Crabapple Cove to save a life.

The Colonel would have liked that. They all would have liked that.

But they would never know.

Hawkeye couldn't imagine ever seeing any of them again.

_1968, February_

Hawkeye threw the newspaper down in disgust on a cold February morning. He usually read it as he sipped his coffee before leaving for work, but these past years as the United States became more and more involved in another useless war, another police action, he found it harder to pay much attention.

Every time he read about another boy – he swore they were still getting younger – dying on the other side of the world, all he could picture was what it had been like for the guy trying to patch him up and not succeeding. He prayed that he had people around him as good as the people he had known, people who made him laugh in the midst of all that terror.

It had been years since he talked with them, but they haunted him that night when he tried to sleep.

He made sure that for every bad memory he remembered, he would remember a joke Trapper had made or a drunken night that hadn't just been about drowning themselves to forget.

It was easier to laugh than it was to cry.

_1953, November_

Hawkeye hadn't been home for that long. A few months, maybe. He really wasn't sure. He just knew that the war was over, and that he was home.

He'd been in and out of psychiatric hospitals since he'd been back, the doctors still concerned from his breakdown in Korea. Hawkeye was convinced that he was fine, that being away from Korea and back in Crabapple Cove had cured him of all that had ailed him. The visits had slowed, and he was thankful for that.

He hadn't yet gone back to a job. It wouldn't have been hard to find one. Hawkeye had been a fantastic surgeon in Korea, but he'd been an even better doctor stateside. Someday soon, he would get on that, but for now, he tried to enjoy not having any responsibilities. He felt like about twelve years of responsibility had been rolled into the few years he'd spent in Korea, and he deserved some time off.

So far, he hadn't talked to anyone from the MASH. They'd all promised to keep in contact, and he completely expected to hear from BJ all the time. But he hadn't. He suspected that BJ was fitting himself nicely into his old life, making up for lost time with the daughter and wife he'd missed so terribly while he was away. He probably wanted nothing to do with anyone from that time, and Hawkeye really couldn't blame him.

That's why, when he got his first letter from someone he'd known in Korea, it wasn't who he expected. He looked at his mail from the previous day the next morning, too preoccupied to care the night before.

There, staring him in the face, was a letter.

John McIntyre, MD.

Hawkeye hadn't even needed to read the name to know who had sent the letter. He would have recognized that particular doctor's scrawl anywhere.

He couldn't open it. A few times he slipped his finger in the edge but couldn't bring himself to tear it. He didn't know why, but the letter just rested unopened on the table in front of him. For a moment, he thought maybe he didn't want to know. That he'd been so mad that Trapper had left without saying good-bye that it still hurt.

But he knew he wanted to read it. It was Trapper, for God's sake, the one man who had made him [be] able to deal with Korea. They had laughed together and cried together, and he still couldn't believe he'd spent so much of his time there without him. Hawkeye knew he never would have lasted if he hadn't bonded so instantly with Trapper.

Maybe that's why he didn't want to open it. Maybe he wanted to leave that in the past, keep those happy memories of the past where they were. Maybe he just didn't want to bring back more of the bad memories with the good.

It didn't matter. He had to read it.

_November 7th, 1953_

Hawkeye,

The war has ended. I hope that means they sent you home. I hope I would have heard from you if you'd gotten home sooner, but with your luck, I'm sure you had to stick it out until the very end.

I came home to my family. I never thought I would be so happy to come back to this life, going into work everyday and coming home to kids and a wife every night. It's certainly not the life that I had before the war, and definitely not the one I had during it, but it's the one I have now. Took me a bit to figure that out, but I'm happy now.

I suppose I don't really have much to say. We're not really the sort of guys who write letters to each other, are we? But I miss you, Hawkeye. It's been a long time. We went through hell and back a few times together, but I like to think we managed to have good times in spite of it.

Good luck, Hawkeye. I know you'll do well in the States. Some guys don't, but you're not that kind of guy except when you have a healthy dose of gin. Hopefully we'll see each other again, though I'm not sure either of our livers will be in the kind of shape to handle that kind of reunion.

\- Trapper

Hawkeye read the letter three times before he had any reaction.

That day, he went out. He drove to the local hospital, and he hoped they'd have a position open for him. Trapper had reminded him with that letter that Hawkeye Pierce wasn't the kind of guy who moped around at his dad's house.

They had kept each other doing the right things during the war, and now Trapper was doing it again, with just a letter. It took Hawkeye a few weeks to write Trapper back, but he finally did.

How could he not?

_1952, January_

Hawkeye smiled as he looked around the tent. They'd just had a particularly bad day. Quite literally, the time they'd spent in surgery had been about an entire twenty-four hours, but somehow, none of them were tired. They'd reached that point where pure adrenaline kept them awake because they had to be awake, and it hadn't quite worn off.

The smiles might have been delirium, but Hawkeye wasn't so sure. It could have been the already impressive quantity of gin he'd drank, but he'd been plenty depressed after a day like today after drinking that much.

No, it was the company. Trapper, Henry, Radar. Frank was still on duty, stuck watching over the patients in post-op with Margaret. No, it was just the four of them that night, cracking jokes, pouring each other gin, and laughing good-naturedly at Radar who was trying to join the drinking crowd for the night and making a face every time the gin touched his tongue.

Hawkeye sat back in his red robe, feet up on the furnace, just smiling as he looked around at them. He laughed when Trapper made fun of Radar, and he smiled when Henry just patted Radar on the back.

Three of the best guys in the universe. He couldn't imagine having gotten through this without them. Without his best friend, without the younger brother he'd never had, without Henry. He hated the place they all were, but equally, he loved them.

Hawkeye couldn't imagine never seeing any of them again.


End file.
